A surgeon from Sierra Leone who is critically ill with Ebola has been flown to the United States for treatment.<br /><br />Transferred to a waiting ambulance, Dr Martin Salia was taken to the Nebraska Medical Centre, one of four American hospitals approved by the federal government to receive people with the deadly disease.<br /><br />Medical officials say Dr Salia, 44, who is a permanent resident in the US, appears sicker than previous patients treated there.<br /><br />The surgeon caught Ebola while working at a hospital in Sierra Leone’s capital Freetown according to his family.<br /><br />His evacuation was at the request of his wife, a US citizen who lives in Maryland and who has agreed to reimburse the US government for any expense, the US State Department said in a statement.<br /><br />More than 5,000 people have now died in the world’s worst recorded Ebola outbreak, with most victims in Sierra Leone, Liberia and Guinea. <br /><br />The West African countries’ already weak healthcare systems have been overrun by victims of the disease. A total of 570 local health workers have been infected, with 324 dying.
